Suddenly everybody's talking about visiting their great-aunts and their great-uncles these days, even if they're a little bit off your route. Have YOU noticed? There was a story on Onion News just the other day.
WARREN, MI—Saying the establishment was both close to the
airport and just off the highway, your dad announced Monday that he knows of a
great hotel just 10 miles away from the city you’re visiting.
“It’s a pretty good deal, and if you do decide to head
downtown, they have a shuttle bus that can drop you off at the subway station,”
said your dad of the suburban Country Inn & Suites located a full 90-minute
train ride away from your vacation destination.
“They have a business centre in case you need to print your
plane ticket and a continental breakfast so you can grab a banana or some corn
flakes instead of shelling out $15 for some ritzy brunch in the city. The area
isn’t really walkable, but I was able to get to that Fuddruckers on the other
side of the parking lot when I stayed there for work.”
At press time, your dad also suggested trying to squeeze in a
visit with your great-aunt and great-uncle who live just a few hours from the
hotel. [My bold formatting]
Well, have I got news for you! Yes, I'm now a great-uncle myself, and I couldn't be more pleased about it, so drop in and see me some time!
Yes, spot the great-uncle in this picture, taken during yesterday's dessert course
of Nigella Lawson's nectarine and blueberry galette. I'm seen
here with Lois, already a great-aunt several times over, and
(left to right) our daughter Sarah and her 10-year-old twins Lily and Jessica
And make sure that you go and get your souvenir gift mugs now, and send or bring them to me asap! Yes, snap up one of those "Best Great Uncle" mugs, because they're soon going to be in short supply, and are sure to go up in price!
This is my favourite, incidentally, available from the Australian Amazon, currently at the bargain price of $32.39 (Australian) or £16.99 in sterling.
Just saying!
Yes, I've become a great-uncle, not just a "great uncle" or a "great-uncle by marriage", like I was until today. And here he is - the little 'cheeky chappie' himself, my first ever not-by-marriage great-nephew, napping just like his great-uncle does, but over in "Cot 20" of St Mary's Hospital, Manchester, stylishly sporting the current year, his birth-year, on his baby-grow.
He was born today to my lovely niece Zoe and her partner Chris.
my first-ever great-nephew - awwwwww, how cute can you get!!!
And what I estimate as "my 2-3000 close friends and relatives" are set to become active in what will soon be very much a seller's market, snapping up those "Best Great-Uncle" mugs. Don't put it off - or you'll regret it!
Just saying!
[That's enough "new great-uncle" stuff! - Ed]
10:15 But don't come and see me this morning. Both Lois and I are "putting our feet up" with "foot-woman", Joanne, who's come to remind us that we're both old, by cutting our toe-nails. Isn't it nice to have your feet 'oiled and spoiled' by a pair of gentle hands, though - it's worth being old just to get pampered in that way, at least that's the "spin" that we put on it!
Joanne's got a lovely touch, and a lovely line in foot-woman "chat", that's for sure! I'm not really a great chatterbox by nature, but I find myself chatting nonstop to Joanne because it seems weird not to.
After all, she's sitting there working on my feet for a good 20 minutes, so I bring up various subjects, like my new status as a great-uncle [Don't mention that again! - Ed], also about our daughter Sarah's family, newly arrived from 7 years in Australia and having to get used to a dark and damp English November, plus the recent Bonfire Night - you would not BELIEVE how many topics I find to raise. I can see now, that I could easily have become a TV chat-show host, and the tragedy is that it's now too late now to realise that ambition. Damn!
some of Joanne's tools-of-the-trade: a few are placed handily
on our little coffee-table, while others are lodged in her
foot-woman-style "pouch"
At least with Joanne I'm able to keep talking - she doesn't lodge any of her tools in my mouth while she's massaging my feet: she's got her own little pouch to keep them in, which is nice, and she stows others away close by, on our coffee-table, as she works.
It was a different story last week when Lois and I visited our new dental hygienist, Traci - we both found that she was a bit absent-minded, and she tends to ask you questions when she's got various implements in your mouth, so the only way you can answer is to say weird things like, "mmm butmmmmm mmmmmm".
What a crazy world we live in !!!!!
our new dental hygienist, Traci, in the local headlines again, bless her!
14:00 We go to bed. I think that both Lois and I are trying to have a nice relaxing day after a busy weekend, hosting our daughter and family, as well as, in my case, being sole judge in the 2023 "World Best-Dressed Barbie" Contest.
flashback to yesterday: the moment when news of the awards
was flashed out to a waiting world
You know how it is with old codgers - if they've got more than one thing that they've absolutely "got to do" during the day, it makes it a quote "very busy day" unquote. I used to smile when my mother used to say things like that, but now I say the same things myself, so I've got my come-uppance at last, that's for sure.
When Lois and I get out of bed, we settle down at the PC and work on choosing 13 photos for our 2024 Photobox Calendar, advertised at 50% off until midnight tonight, so we hurry to put in our order with the Photobox people this afternoon.
[footnote: annoyingly when I wake up the next morning I find that Photobox are now advertising "70% off for Black Friday", but I'm going to try not to let that eat away at me, so please don't mention it in my presence!]
[
! - Ed] I SAID, DON'T MENTION IT!
Ugh !!!!!
21:00 We go to bed on a last night's interesting retrospective on the life of acerbic newspaper columnist and TV presenter Bernard Levin (1928-2004).
Levin, who used to write the UK's most famous daily newspaper column, tells us how he wakes up each day with an idea already formed in his head about what he's going to write about in his column.
In his daily column, he could write about anything: not just the news and politics, but also opera, food, travel, you name it.
He never pretended to be objective, and you always knew where he stood, something which is quite usual today but certainly wasn't the case when he started his career, so he was a trailblazer in that way.
And in his task of winning readers over to his viewpoint, he liked to use humour.
His grandparents, Lithuanian Jews, fled their homes with their extended families in the early years of the 20th century, bound for the US, but somehow Bernard's grandparents got separated off from the main "Levin Family group", and ended up in the UK by mistake. However the UK was their second choice destination, so it wasn't a complete disaster exactly, which was nice!
As a savagely critical columnist and TV interviewer, Bernard Levin was famous for having absolutely no sense of deference, no matter who he was talking about or talking to. He was a passionate hater of totalitarianism and persistent champion of Soviet dissident Solzhenitsyn. And his mission was always first and foremost to expose all "fraudsters", especially if they were politicians.
Levin's use of the English language was always masterful. However, somewhat surprisingly perhaps, he also wanted the all best things in his life, whether it was the best food and wine, or the most beautiful women, as well as some occasional peace and quiet to read Shakespeare or Dickens, or to listen to the world's most beautiful music: Mozart, Wagner etc etc. Yes, he wanted it all.
On an appearance in Washington DC with actors Maggie Smith and Alex McCowan, he wrote and performed a compilation of Shakespeare lines that are a part of our everyday lives.
"If you cannot understand my argument, and declare that 'It's all Greek to me!', you are quoting Shakespeare. If you claim to be 'more sinned against than sinning', you are quoting Shakespeare. If you recall your 'salad days', you are quoting Shakespeare. If you 'act more in sorrow than in anger', if your 'wish is father to the thought', if your lost property has 'vanished into thin air', you are quoting Shakespeare.
If you've ever 'refused to budge an inch' or ' suffered from green-eyed jealousy', or if you've 'played fast and loose', if you've been 'tongue-tied', or 'a tower of strength', or 'hoodwinked' or 'in a pickle', if you've 'knitted your brows', 'made a virtue of necessity', if you've 'insisted on fair play', if you 'haven't slept a wink', 'stood on ceremony', or if you've 'danced attendance on your lord and master', 'laughed yourself into stitches', or been given 'short shrift' or 'cold comfort', or 'had too much of a good thing', if you have 'seen better days' or 'lived in a fool's paradise', then 'be that as it may', 'more fool you!', you've been quoting Shakespeare!
And if you've ever said, 'What the dickens?', 'But me no buts!', or 'It is all one to me', then you've been quoting Shakespeare.
But Levin also had an eye for beautiful places and also beautiful women. In one of his travel programmes, this one all about a trip down the River Rhine, he visited the Friedrichsbad, a mixed bathing spa in Baden-Baden, once frequented by Edward VII, before he became king.
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!
! - Ed]
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